In a ruling passed by forum president H S Ghare and member A A Datar, the Charai Telephone Exchange has been ordered to restore Khandhadia's telephone connection without any reconnection charges and without placing the condition of payment of outstanding bills. However, MTNl will be at liberty to adjust part of the amount of damages towards recovery of arrears. Khandhadia has been asked to pay arrears of bills for the old and new telephone numbers, as well as rental charges up to December 1998.

The telephone was disconnected in June 1994 for bills unpaid in the month of January and March 1994. He had to pay for rental charges from June 1994 to January 1998 despite the lack of connection. He was later charged forinternal extension rental charges, which was totally unjustified according to the consumer.

He approached the general manager and the telephone adalat complaining against the faulty billing. Thereafter, he moved the consumer forum claiming mental agony and loss of business due to the telephone disconnection. According to the general manager, the complainant had been given a chance to pay outstanding bills and get the telephone reconnected. But the telephone was disconnected due to lack of response. Moreover, the outstanding bills were accounted for the old telephone number of the consumer.

According to the forum, the telephone exchange did not have any record of the dates of despatch of the old bills in order to prove the non-payment. Moreover, the outstanding amount for the old number was shown in the bill for the new telephone number. The consumer too could not prove the payment of the outstanding amount. The forum has stated that Khandadia could have paid the bills under protest and got the telephonereconnected, his claim for damages notwithstanding.